Thursday, December 27, 2012

It's Just Toothpaste

Herself was reading some fluffy unimportant article about the predominance of airbrushing in celebrity photos this morning, and the web page had little pop-up ads, complete with sound, on the sidebar.  One that kept repeating was an ad for a whitening toothpaste.  It went as follows:

:::piano music, cuts between a comely, toothy young woman and an artfully scruffy young man, sitting in separate places in a restaurant:::
He could be the one...
:::shot of them crossing a quaint street in Paris, Eiffel Tower in the background, his arm over her shoulder:::
Soulmate...
:::close-up shot of them kissing on a beach, a white bridal wreath in her hair:::
Husband...
:::view of her in a floral print dress, cradling a very pregnant belly, followed by a closeup of him smiling benignly at a toddler seated next to him:::
Loving father to your children...
:::back to the first shots in the restaurant:::
But first, you've got to get him to say, 'hello.'
:::description of tooth-whitening toothpaste and accoutrements, and the results available in a mere two days:::
What will a [product]-white smile do for you?
:::shot of him sitting down at the table with her:::
Life opens up when you do. 

:::end commercial:::

:::silence:::

Really?

Two days of a whitening toothpaste, and she will be able to attract a total stranger who miraculously will become soulmate, husband, and father of children, merely by smiling at him? On which planet was this filmed, exactly?  (Well, clearly one that similarly idealizes Paris as A City For Lovers and beaches as romantic settings.) And we wonder why young girls and women have unrealistic expectations about relationships, and why they so oftentimes become overly concerned with their appearances?  I know not everything needs to be an accurate depiction of the long, involved, and oftentimes strenuous road of finding and keeping a spouse and maintaining a family, but at the same time, why must a toothpaste advertisement paint such an unrealistic fairy tale?

I know, it's just a commercial.

Still.


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